RIYADH, 20 September 2007 — Saudi mobile phone operator Etihad Etisalat (Mobily) said yesterday it agreed, under a memorandum of understanding (MOU), to buy 99.9 percent of local data provider Bayanat Al-Oula for SR1.5 billion ($400 million).
“Our acquisition of Bayanat widens Mobily’s investment base in a manner that allows Mobily to grow by providing high quality data communication services in the Kingdom, thereby increasing shareholder value,” Abdulaziz Al-Saleh Al-Sughayer, Etihad Etisalat’s chairman of the board of directors.
Bayanat was licensed last year by the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) to build, manage and operate a data communications network in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The Mobily deal represents a buyout of Bayanat stake in the 12,000 kilometer national fiber-optic network.
Bayanat itself recently announced that it had entered into a strategic arrangement with Samsung to roll out the largest WiMAX network in the region and start offering the service commercially in the Kingdom three main cities — Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam — in the first phase.
Meanwhile, Mobily and Bayanat further announced yesterday that they were working toward acquiring permission from the CITC to finalize their arrangement.
The deal represents more commitment from Mobily to the wireless broadband Internet segment, as WiMAX, according to Mobily executives, is expected to complement Mobily’s current HSDPA-based mobile broadband Internet proposition.
WiMax — seen as the big brother to the WiFi standard, that only work near to a transmitter — allows anyone with a WiMax enabled laptop or media device to download songs, movies and business presentations over distances of up to 50 km (30 miles).
Mobily broke ground in May when it became one of very few global operators to offer unlimited mobile broadband Internet at a competitive rate of SR350, while shifting data consumption conversation from kilobytes to gigabytes.
The new acquisition places Mobily in a position to offer integrated services to the public.
